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“He and I are going to continue our discussions,” LaHood said. “We had a meeting a week or so after the election, and we agreed to continue talking. … I think the president will get back to some of these discussions after some kind of a deal is reached on the fiscal matters.”

Earlier, LaHood told incoming House Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman Bill Shuster (R-Pa.) that the two will work together in the near term, Shuster told POLITICO. Speculation swirled around LaHood’s future after he recently backed off comments made last year that he would retire after the president’s first term.

“I got a call from Secretary LaHood; it sounds like he may be staying for a while. I’m not sure exactly what his timing is, but I’m sure there will be an announcement,” Shuster said in an interview just off the House floor.

“I said, ‘Are we going to work together?’ And he goes, ‘Yes, for a while.’”

“He’s talked to the president,” Shuster said. The future chairman hedged a bit, saying that with all the “high-level, high-profile” Cabinet posts that likely need to be filled — like the Defense Department and the State Department — Obama might plead with LaHood to stay on board. “My guess is — I don’t know this for a fact — but [Obama] said, ‘Hey LaHood, stick around.’”

A DOT spokesman would not comment Tuesday on LaHood’s long-term future and pointed to an earlier remark to POLITICO. In September, the secretary said, “If I’m still around next year, I’m going to try and push Congress” to pass a national texting-while-driving law — an ambitious goal that couldn’t be achieved easily in the first few months of the 113th Congress.

Shuster and LaHood have known each other for years and served together in the House for nearly a decade. Shuster said he works well with the secretary and pointed out a link that sometimes gets lost amid the strongly Democratic administration: “He’s a Republican,” Shuster said.